


No Longer a Danger To Myself Or Others

by madbee



Category: Barry (TV 2018)
Genre: Angst, Eventual Smut, F/M, Fluff, Sad
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-03
Updated: 2020-10-03
Packaged: 2021-03-08 01:41:56
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,105
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26787634
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/madbee/pseuds/madbee
Summary: Margot is trying to sleep and Barry is a mess.
Relationships: Barry Berkman/Original Female Character(s)
Kudos: 7





	No Longer a Danger To Myself Or Others

Margot is sitting in the kitchen, her back facing the door leading out to the backyard. She leans against the wooden kitchen chair and stares at the morning light reflecting off the white tiles and cabinets. Her husband says something. Her husband?

She glances down at her hand, the small band glimmers in the sun pouring from the windows.  
Or course, her husband.

“Did you hear me?” He says.

Despite the amount of sunlight, his face remains in shadows, but she feels it's probably a lovely one.  
“No, I’m sorry, my mind is somewhere else.” Her voice comes out a whisper.

“I said do you want to walk down to the river with me?” She’s about to ask how far away the river is when she hears frantic banging coming from the front of the house. She quickly looks around, startled by the noise.

“Don’t worry, I’ll get it.” He says, turning from her. The banging starts again somehow louder than before.

“No don’t.” She tries to speak but her voice feels so faint and far away like someone is slowly turning the volume down. “Please don’t, it’s him.” She tries to warn but he can no longer hear her. She attempts to move from her chair but her feet stay firmly planted to the ground as if glued there. Margot watches in horror as her husband disappears down the hall. 

“No Please.” She gasps.

A large crash sends her entire body upright. Her mind is racing, trying to understand where she is and frantically grabbing onto her bedsheets. She reaches over to her lamp on the left side of her bed and clumsily knocks over an empty glass of water before finally locating the switch. She hears more noise coming from somewhere in the apartment. She gets up and falls to her knees, feeling around under her bed before grabbing onto the long metal bat tucked between one of her old suitcases. 

She glances at her clock by the bed: 3:00 am. Someone must be breaking in, she thinks. It was bound to happen, especially in this neighborhood. She slowly opens her bedroom door and peeks into the small kitchen of her apartment. When the coast is clear she steps out onto the cold tile, sending shivers up her body from her bare feet. Damn this apartment gets cold, she thinks. 

She hears more shuffling and her body freezes, her heart pounding against her chest. It’s coming from the living room, just behind the half wall separating the kitchen from the front of the apartment. She carefully moves towards the entrance, gripping her bat tight. The shuffling becomes more clear with each step. Margot takes a final deep breath before turning the corner.

“WHO ARE Y-” She begins to shout before dropping the metal bat on the floor, her mouth agape. A large dark figure lays on the floor, next to a pile of books and a broken vase, scattered beside the mass. Things she had planned to re-organize tomorrow. It’s him.

“Barry.” She whispers. She lands on her knees and pushes his heavy form so he is facing up. His breathing is slow, but still there. “Barry, Barry wake up.” She shakes him gently. He groans in response and murmurs something under his breath. “What?” She asks.

“You wouldn’t answer the door or your phone.” He croaks followed by another groan of pain.

“What's wrong?

He lifts a hand towards his left shoulder, “Got stabbed.”

“What!?” She shouts.

“It's not that bad,” he lets out a shuddered breath, “would have taken care of it myself but… lost too much... blood.” It's now that Margot notices his bloody nose and mouth. 

“You need to go to the hospital.” Her voice is shaking.

“No!” His voice raises and he grabs her wrist staring up at her. “Please, no hospital.”  
She stares at him in shock for a few seconds, her thoughts racing around 1000 miles per hour.

“Fuck Barry I need to get you to the bathroom.” He nods and slowly begins to lift himself off the floor, using Margot as a crutch. She carefully leads him to the tiny bathroom. 

The room was barely enough space for the two to squeeze into. Barry sets himself in the bathtub to give Margot enough space to open up the cabinet under the sink.

“I need stitches.” He breathes leaning his back against the bathtub wall. At a different time, Margot would perhaps giggle at how large he looks in the tiny ceramic tub- one of his long legs hanging over the top almost touching the floor. But no, instead she was focused on the first aid kit her nurse mother had given her before moving out. 

For some reason, her mom had gotten it in her head that Margot was going to end up hurting herself while cutting vegetables, or perhaps give herself a big enough paper cut that she would bleed out on the floor. 

She finds the large kit at the back of the sink and pulls it out flipping it open. The gift had seemed so over the top at the time but now she thanked her mother in her mind.

She had seen her mother and the other nurses give stitches plenty of times, had even practiced off fake skin one summer at the hospital. But that was almost 11 years ago.

She turns to Barry. “Take off your hoodie.” 

He nods and unzips his hoodie and throws it to the ground and takes off his grey t-shirt as well. Margot inspects the cut, the wound is deep but not too deep. She loads a clean paper towel with alcohol and begins to clean the wound. He tenses up and keeps his eyes focused on her hands, his eyes make her feel warm. 

Once done she pulls out the stitch kit. “I don’t have anything that can numb the pain besides some Advil,” She says.

His eyes widened and then shut. “It’s fine, just do it.” 

She’s about to press the needle in when he grabs her wrist. She freezes. He points behind her. “Give me that rag.” She hands him it and he stuffs the clean cloth into his mouth. Barry gives her a nod and a small smile. 

This part is really gonna hurt.

…

Margot thinks it went well. The wound was stitched and bandaged. She had searched the kit for the Advil, anything to make the pain a little easier. He seemed a little less out of it once the blood loss stopped, finally returning back to earth. Barry now laid on her bed, as she gently used a washcloth to clean the dried blood from his nose and mouth. 

“Are you sure your nose isn't broken?” She finally says after a long draw of silence.

He opens his eyes and looks up at her, placing one large hand on her thigh. More warmth.

He nods, “it's fine. I’m fine, thank you.” Barry squeezes her thigh and his thumb slowly rubs over her bare skin beneath the hem of her shorts. He had become oddly sentimental after Margot completed his stitches. After she had tied the last stitch he had dropped the rag from his mouth and let out a long breath before planting a kiss on her mouth. 

She had assumed it was perhaps relief that the pain was over, or that he wasn't gonna bleed out in an alley somewhere that made him act this way. He usually was never this… soft.

When done cleaning his face she wonders if she should just throw the bloody rag away or try and salvage it in the wash. She decides on the ladder and throws it into her laundry basket lazily. 

“I’m sorry,” Barry says, his voice faint, far away.

“It’s okay.” She pauses, back still turned from him. “Actually no it’s not.” Her voice is even. She seats herself at the edge of the bed and spins around. “Why do you do shit like this?” She searches his face for a response, his grey eyes seem to catch fire in the light of the streetlamp pouring through her bedroom window. Silver suns, she thinks. 

He shakes his head and props himself up, back against her headboard. “What do you mean?”

“You don’t call me for 4 months and then you break into my fucking apartment. I could have hit you ya know? I had my bat out… thought you were a robber or a rapist or something.” Margot lays her hands in her lap and fiddles with her sleeves. Why did he always do this to her?

“Oh yeah, I saw that. Very classic… the bat under the bed I mean.” He gives her a smile but she keeps her head turned down from him. 

Another long pause.

“Hey.” He speaks and leans his long arm towards her, hand open. “Come mere’.” She stares for a moment and then lets her hand sneak into his, crawling over to him. He takes her hand and presses it to his lips. When he releases her hand from his mouth, he opens his lips as if to say something but closes it again. His eyes look far away focused on her hand. 

Even in her own damn bed, Barry Berkman was unreachable. 

She wants to ask questions. She wants to ask why he’s hurt and who hurt him. She wants to ask why he disappeared without a goodbye. She wants to know why he never called. Hell, even an email just saying he was okay would have sufficed. 

No. No, these are questions that will just make him go away again. Margot decides within that moment it's better to stay silent than the alternative. 

The void he leaves behind is corrosive.

Barry brings his arm around her and encourages her to lean on his uninjured shoulder. He glances at the clock, “4:47, shit do you have work in the morning?” 

She shakes her head, her cheek rubbing against his shoulder. “No, later in the day.” She suddenly perks up. “Wait how did you get in through the front door?” 

He smiles, nervously, “I might have broken your lock... sorry.” He brings her closer, “I’ll fix it before I leave I promise.” She rolls her eyes and lets out a light laugh.

“So besides bleeding on my floor, making me stitch you up and waking me up from an interesting dream you also broke my front door.” He laughs and she can feel it rolling in his chest.

“Just the lock.” He pauses. “Wait, a dream?”

“Yeah a very interesting one, so it’s gonna be really hard for me to forgive you.”

He gives her a shocked face, “oh no! What about?”

She opens her mouth but stops. What was she dreaming about?

“Shit. I think I’ve already forgotten.”

“Already?” He raises his eyebrows in amusement. 

“Well, my mind was preoccupied when I woke up.” She gives him a look and he smiles. Margot untucks the blanket from under Barry and throws it over the two of them, sinking into the pillows.   
She lets her head lay against Barry’s chest and feels his breathing carry her head up and down, up and down. 

This was the best part- the purest part about knowing Barry. 

Just being able to share the same silence, living in it together. 

“A kitchen.” Her voice is soft.

“Hmm?” 

“There was a kitchen in my dream… Well, I think I was in a kitchen.” 

“That doesn’t sound very interesting.” He lets out a chuckle, “maybe I don’t know what interesting dreams are.”

“There was more.” She huffs. “But it’s gone now.”

“That's the worst part about dreams.” He lets out a yawn. “It’s like living a whole life you can’t remember… and now it's stuck in your head somewhere.”

She presses her lips to his chest and lets out a hum in agreement. Barry’s breath slows and evens out as he falls asleep but Margot remains conscious. A piece of her feared his body would have a bad reaction to the stitches, so she stayed awake, eyes eventually resting on the darkest corner of the room.

Maybe if she tried hard enough she could remember the dream and go back. She wonders if Barry will be gone by the time she wakes up and briefly considers the absurdity of their relationship. 

Her eyelids droop down and her head rolls back. 

Becoming vulnerable against a bad man's chest. 

She dreams of Barry in the kitchen. His strong handsome face illuminated by the morning sun. He smiles at her, as he washes bright red blood from his hands.


End file.
